Science

The following science pages will show how X-rays have become a mainstream tool for examining the structure and function of our material world, with an eye towards designing new materials, solving technological problems, and even curing diseases.

Partners

The National Science Foundation will support a “sub-facility” at CHESS. Other federal and state agencies, private foundations, academic institutions, and private industry will become partners, supporting and developing other portions of CHESS.

Public

About

The Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source is a high-intensity X-ray source which provides our users state-of-the-art synchrotron radiation facilities for research in Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and Environmental and Materials Sciences.

Science Case

This science case will help to establish a scientific foundation that will inform CHESS’s strategic planning and investments over the next several years.

CHESS-U will generate high-flux, hard (10 keV) and high-energy (>25 keV) 3rd generation synchrotron X-ray beams, as well as high single-shot flux. This document highlights a subset of the compelling opportunities that these exquisite X-ray beams will enable scientists to pursue. It links these opportunities to CHESS-U’s capabilities and explains potential impacts on science, technology, and society. The research community identified these and other opportunities at a series of six international workshops held in June 2016.

This science case will help to establish a scientific foundation that will inform CHESS’s strategic planning and investments over the next several years. During the ongoing CHESS planning process, we will balance the scientific opportunities and impact with instrumentation needs, available resources, and infrastructure.

Preparation of this Science Case

In collaboration with its External Advisory Committee (EAC) and Users’ Executive Committee (UEC), CHESS organized six workshops on specific scientific topics. Teams of local and external organizers developed speaker lists. In total, the workshops involved 21 organizers, 60 speakers, and 351 participants (in person or virtually). Each workshop generated one or more white papers. The workshop organizers, CHESS scientists, EAC, and UEC identified seven themes from the white papers: structural materials, high-precision plant phenotyping, nanocrystal superlattices, in-situ processing of organic semiconductors, atomically thin films and interfaces, catalysts, and disordered materials. The remainder of this document describes each scientific theme. In each theme, CHESS-U plays an indispensable and powerful role in enabling scientific progress.

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The Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS), a national user facility, is supported by the National Science Foundation under award DMR-1332208. CHESS is operated and managed for the National Science Foundation by Cornell University.